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<!-- Casting SPELs in Lisp - Emacs Lisp Edition, a Comic Book
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  <title>Casting SPELs in Lisp (6)</title>
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        <b>Syntax and Semantics</b>
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      Every computer language has code that is made up of <i>syntax</i> 
      and <i>semantics</i>. The <i>syntax</i> of a programming language 
      is the basic skeleton your program has to follow so that the Emacs 
      Lisp interpreter knows what's what in your program; so it can tell 
      what's a function, a variable, etc. The <i>semantics</i> of a program 
      are the more "random" stuff, like the different commands you have 
      available and what variables you're allowed to look at at any point 
      in the program. The first thing that is special about Lisp is that 
      it has the simplest syntax of any major programming language.
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      Basically, the Lisp syntax dictates that any text you give the Emacs
      Lisp interpreter has to be arranged into lists, which can be nested
      into lists of lists as deeply as needed. Parentheses are used to mark the
      beginning and end of each list:
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      &lt;&lt; <a href="casting-spels-emacs-1.html">begin</a>
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